


The Life and Times of Henry Leland

by Rigil_Kentauris



Category: Alpha Protocol
Genre: Angst, Backstory, Behind the Scenes, Evil Corporations, Gen, oneshots
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-31
Updated: 2016-09-01
Packaged: 2018-08-12 04:12:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7920049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rigil_Kentauris/pseuds/Rigil_Kentauris
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Interoga - <em> interviewing</em> wayward rogue agents is only one small part of Henry Leland's schedule. The rest is photojournalists, skittish board members, conceited wanna-bes trying to drag Alpha Protocol away from him - it's always <em>something</em>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Board Meetings with the Halbechs Part I

**Author's Note:**

> I will be adding more tags as I add small bits and pieces to this. Also, I will adding tags...as soon as I figure out which ones I need to be using for this. I've come a long way from forty days ago, but I still am not super familiar with tagging conventions. This, I suppose, only hurts me.
> 
> Anyways. Posting this on 8/31, so Happy Henry Leland day, all! I sure do hate this guy.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That article about Halbech by Ms. Scarlet Lake is nothing. Not important. Don't even worry about it. Henry Leland is fully in charge of his company folks so please don't go around saying he isn't. Please? Halbech has enough on its hands at the moment. Seriously.

“It’s just a small setback,” Leland said, hand smoothing his yellow tie.

He was lying. She _knew_ he was lying, it was that banana yellow tie. He’d worn it the day he told them they’d lost the Aubergine contract. He’d worn it the day they’d had to shut down the French branch. He’d worn it the day Flight 6133 was downed by ‘unidentified missiles’, the day he’d spent all morning throwing drafts of the press release into the trash, gritting his teeth, finally accepting her advice.

“Why do we need to send one out at all, if we really had nothing to do with it?” she’d prompted. And he’d stood still, smoothed the regurgitated yellow strip of cloth out, looked her in the eye.

“We didn’t, of course. That’s a good point.”

She hadn’t doubted it. She wasn’t paid to. The last Halbech in the family, the last one in the company? She was there as a rubber stamp, to approve whatever Leland said, to keep The Shareholders off The Visionary’s back. She hadn’t doubted it, even though she knew he was lying.

“It’s just a small setback,” he said. She and the other board members looked down at the small, innocuous article.

“Of course,” said Board Member Number Four. “I mean, it’s from in-flight magazine, for god’s sake!”

It detailed plans, plans she had never signed off on, profit-loss comparisons for a recall on defective armor. PROTECT OUR TROOPS? it said.

“You had better handle this, Leland,” said Board Member Number Eight.

PROTECT OUR TROOPS? - _Scarlet Lake._ Such a small question mark. Such a big question.

“I am taking care of it personally, Imogene.” His hand went back up to the tie, creating a wrinkle, then working it back out.

She knew what would happen next. Leland would make the problem disappear, like he always did. Like he did with the Aubergine contract, and the sudden collapse of the company that had gotten it instead of Halbech. Like he did when he folded the losses from the French branch into the formation of the German one. Like he did when he brought her the lighter, told her to take care of all the trashed press releases.

He would take care of this Scarlet Lake. And whomever gave her the info.

She wondered, for a moment, while Board Members Ten and Two began arguing about how we can’t _not_ issue a recall now, if Scarlet Lake was the kind of woman who would have burned those messages

Probably not.

Then again, she herself could be either taken care of or _taken care_ of. Scarlet Lake would never write again, if she was lucky, while she herself got to go home at night in a loaded BMW and throw darts at a picture of Henry Leland’s face.

She sighed. Defying Leland? It was not worth thinking about. Still…he didn’t have to know what papers she read, in the comfort of her own home. He didn’t have to know, if she started looking out for anything by this Lake woman. He didn’t need to know that she hadn’t burned _all_ the memos.

And who knows? she thought. Maybe next time, when I see that horrid yellow tie come out, I might doubt. I might do something. Maybe next time. Maybe next time.


	2. Board Meetings with the Halbechs Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leland is not fond of things being out of control. Unfortunately, things are out of control - ish.

She was supposed to be on _his_ side. He’d hired her. Goddamn it, he’d given Lake half her business. He didn’t know even half of what her business composed, but the thought that she might have endeavors outside of his designs did not dare cross his mind. She was _his_. An employee. A tool. Hammers did not nail nails into one’s own coffin, not when one’s own fist was supposed to be wrapped firmly around it. Impossible.

PROTECT OUR TROOPS?

With a _question mark_?!

The board was going to lose it. There were whispers, after Flight 6133. There were significantly fewer whispers, after the wave of dismissals. It was a hard line, and he intended to enforce it. There will be no treason against The Company.

The Company.

You devote your life to something, and this is what you get. A four paragraph spread in a goddamn in-flight magazine threatening to take it all away from you. He built Halbech. He _built_ it. Not that slobbering, womanizing idiot Robert Halbech (the third! he would say, indignantly). Not his melodramatic, insincere, art-history-student of a suicide son, Bobby (no ‘the fourth’ there). And certainly not his weak-willed rubber stamp of a sister.

The thing that really got him, was that Lake was clearly screwing with him. She’d been hired to eliminate Ronald Sung. She’d been responsible for taking out the head of Corpascic Advanced Tech, for single-handedly delivering Leland control of the burgeoning biostealth tech industry. She knew how deep his involvement with Alpha Protocol went, hell, she probably could guess his plans. If she’d wanted to ruin him, she could have. If she’d wanted to go public, any newspaper would have killed an intern to get her. If she’d wanted him dead, he probably would have stopped breathing years ago, but this? This?! This was an insult. This was infuriating. This was…

_This is just a minor setback_ , he told himself, hands going for his tie. _She isn’t out to hurt you. She probably just wants something. People wanting things, you can handle._

First things first. Get in front of it, calm the board down, get the recall out and get the media team awake. 

And then Lake.

He replaced the magazine on his desk, spun around, and was almost to the door when he realized something. For all that Scarlet did know, she did not know about their R&D. She couldn’t have found out about the defect in the body armor. Not without help.

The grin spread slowly. So, someone wanted to play ball with Henry Leland? They were in for a nasty surprise. Mentally, he rearranged his schedule. First, a call to Westridge. Then the board.

It was almost unfair. Whoever she was working with, they wouldn’t see this coming.


	3. In which Leland gets Punched

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I cannot be the only one who thinks there is a really weird dynamic between Leland and Thorton, can I? CAN I?

They’d been through so much together, and Thorton didn’t even realize it. Didn’t realize how carefully Leland had been following his train wreck of a jaunt across Eurasia. Didn’t realize how much trouble he’d _truly_ caused Leland. Didn’t realize Leland felt for him, honestly. Leland had both burned a desk and started a college scholarship for international students the day he’d found out Marburg had killed Madison St. James.

Thorton sat there, leaning back in his chair, one arm tossed over the back of it, like he and Leland were old pals, talking about the latest celebrity gossip, or the newest As Seen On TV product, or whatever…people like him talked about. Leland didn’t know what ‘people like him’ meant. Perhaps it meant today’s youth. Leland was going to enjoy age fifty, finally feeling on the outside what he felt on the inside. Dignified.

He could see right through the agent. Affected disaffection, with the arm over the chair back, but the tension in his muscles betrayed him. Observing everything in the room casually with those curious vibrant green eyes, but the lines under them, the bags, the slight purple tinge around one, shouting, clearly, _I have seen better days than this_.

“Madison St. James.” He’d run the name over his teeth carefully, tasting it, trying yet again to feel what Thorton felt the many times he must have said her name. The ‘m’ sound was nice, full, fun to flick off his lips, the ‘t’ sound as well. Thorton had cringed, visibly, when Leland had said it. And so Leland had known, had been able to see through him. He let Thorton believe otherwise. It was his gift, the only way he had to apologize for those three long months he had let Thorton get away from him.

“I will _never_ join Halbech,” he’d said, spitting the words out, forcing them, like they were boulders Leland had warped into his stomach, and had forced Thorton to throw up. It hurt, to watch him struggle so.

“Best case scenario - execution. Worst case - imprisonment, CIA interrogation for life.” Waterboarding. Sleep deprivation. He could not, did not want, to imagine Thorton that way, beaten, the purple around his eye no longer a bruise, but an open wound, dirty and old. He did not want to imagine him, giving up, giving in, breaking just for the chance at a moment of rest. He’d heard Marburg had tried to electroshock Thorton. Leland had wanted Marburg’s head for that. Lake would have done it, too, for free. He knew she cared, perhaps as much as he did. Perhaps not. He hadn’t needed to, though.

_I would not treat you like that_ , Leland promised mentally, willing the message through his eyes even as Thorton met them with harshly checked fury. _Your eyes are extraordinary._ You _are extraordinary.  
_

Leland ran his fingers over his tie, and sighed. He did not want to condemn Michael to CIA torture. It wouldn’t be for life, of course. Only until Thorton got his head on straight, saw the light. Got free of his rogue mentality.

“You can’t go back, you know.” Thorton’s breathing had frozen, mid-inhale. It had been quiet but Leland had caught the slip all the same, and smiled at it. Thorton could be reached. “Those Marines you killed? You aren’t pretending to be a rogue agent - you _are_ one.”

He could be saved. Leland would bring him back, like he had Marburg. Like he had Lake. Like he had so many others. He was building an empire. Thorton _belonged_ there.

“But you can come back. You can have a second chance, another life, with Halbech. Do you know why I chose you in the first place?”

Leland had tried to explain. Had tried to tell him what he’d seen in Thorton’s file. He saw a patriot. Every mission, flawless, perfect, every single one, working for the people, pushing for a better, safer tomorrow. He saw loyalty. Not to any one agency, but to the idea. The larger mission. To getting out there, doing what needed to be done, what _must_ be done. The same drive that had led him to target Halbech in the first place. In this case, a misplaced instinct. But the kind of passion that drove someone into exile, into the crosshairs of the US government, into Leland’s own crosshairs? Leland needed that, for himself, for his empire, for the world.

He saw a patriot, and he saw loyalty, and he cursed his own pragmatism, but he’d also seen someone who no one would miss. No family. No significant ties. No significant other. All his friends - other agents, who would understand what was meant when they suddenly stopped hearing from him. At first, he’d pushed Westridge to pick someone else, someone _disposable_ , Darcy’s kid and damn the consequences. But no one else could have made it this far. Michael Thorton was one of a kind. He _would_ be missed. Leland would miss him, if no one else would. The world would be the worse without him.

And he’d tried to explain that. “Join Halbech.”

“I will _never_ join Halbech,” he growled. A scar peeking out from his left sleeve made it seem menacing. A threat. I will never join you. I am going to destroy you. _Do not test me,_ said his glittering eyes.

“Best case scenario - execution. Worst case - imprisonment, CIA interrogation for life.” _I would not treat you like that_.

Thorton stiffened, then relaxed, slouching over himself. They’d been talking for hours, about the past three months. Not once, not even when Leland had announced Madison’s name, had he cracked the exterior, had Thorton failed to pretend he wasn’t affected. Not once, had Leland broken past the bravado.

He was concerned. The feeling spiked his system, instantly, unavoidably. His hand went for his tie, stopped itself, reached for Thorton. No. That would be a mistake. He stood instead, walking around the table until he was in front of the slumped-over figure.

“Leland…” Thorton mumbled. It sounded all wrong. It sounded like the Michael of his imagination did, the one who did not listen, the one who had to be taken away for CIA interrogation. The one who, after going through all this, all these months, couldn’t take anymore. What had he done?  _What have I done_ _?_ He only wanted to save him. To help him. To acquire him. Not to destroy him. _I would not treat you like that_ , he’d promised.

“What is it, Mike?”

The man pulled his head up, no smile, no life in his eyes. They were blank. Dead green, like a plant you’d just picked, that you knew was going to die soon, if you did not get it water. What had he done?

“I…” he said, voice trailing off, head dropping again. Leland leaned in closer, despite himself. _I promised I would not treat you like that_.

Then Leland was reeling backwards, hand ripping free from his tie, going to the pulsing throbbing pain in his nose. It hurt like ice. It hurt like nails, driven into it. It hurt like looking back up, into Michael’s raging green eyes, and seeing the fury, no longer checked, boiling over into a sneer, blood splatters all over his fist.

It hurt like watching the two guards charge in, grab Thorton under the arms, and drag him off the chair, pulling him backwards. His eyes never left Leland’s.

“Leland,” he whispered, as they dragged him across the floor. His words were the only thing in the world, not the guards shouting, not the alarm some overexcited fool had set off. Not this pained thought in his head crying _I would never have treated you like that_.

“Leland, I’m going to kill you.”

And he was gone. He left Leland alone, cradling his face, hardly aware of the pain because of the two other feelings surging through him. One, he crushed. The hurt. The _I would never have treated you like that_. The images of what was about to happen to Thorton. The needles. The hallucinogens. The endless nights awake, in the dark, alone. The other thought, detached but still oh so very important, was the triumph. Because after all the unpleasant things that were about to happen to agent Michael Thorton, he would be okay. He’d just proven it. Leland was holding the broken pieces of the proof in his bloody hand. Michael Thorton was extraordinary, but Leland could see through him. Michael would join Leland, sooner or later. He knew it. He _knew_ it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well gosh darn it I think I answered my own darned question. Now that you've read this I most certainly can't be the only one who sees their weird dynamic.  
> Please?  
> It's so alone in Club I Hate Henry Leland.


	4. Leland, and Mina's Very Mysterious Agenda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some first person behind the scenes interaction between Leland and Mina, at the end of the game. Leland's plans, as they often do, go awry when he discovers a Surprising Fact about Mina.

“Let me explain what is going to happen to you now, Ms. Tang.”

She’d stopped struggling in the chair a long time ago. Good. I didn’t have time for her pointless efforts. It was imperative she understand the situation, and quickly.

“I am going to leave you here. You are not going to try and “break out”, or “escape”. You are going to sit put. Do you understand?”

Her head lolled, drops of blood creeping over dried trails to drip onto her coat. I do not approve of people who wear thick coats indoors. But I needed her to be recognizable. The team who’d been responsible for capturing her had been far too enthusiastic in their treatment of her face. Her cheek was swollen. I doubt she could get her eyes open. A patch of scalp, bloody and raw, showed where someone must have torn at her hair, and her ear was split, where someone had ripped out an earring. To say nothing of the bullet wound in her side. By all accounts, she’d put up quite a fight. I would deal with those responsible later. Unharmed, I had requested. For now, I would have to tolerate the coat. 

I studied her. A formidable enemy. I had not seen the betrayal coming. Neither had Westridge. I suppose I should have guessed. Michael Thorton had an effect on people that I could not explain, could only observe and document. He’d elicited the cooperation of G22, for god’s sake. Perhaps this was more because they loathed me, than liked him.

Ms. Tang stirred. I bent over, reached out to brush her long hair forward – what was left of it, at any rate. I rolled the elastic band off my wrist, looped it around my fingers. She wore a ponytail, usually, and if this was going to work, I wanted her to look as recognizable as possible.

“I asked you a question,” I told her, and tugged her hair until she whimpered. The strands were sticky, in places. I did my best to keep my hands clean as I bunched the tufts together in in one fist, pulled it all through the band. Ms. Tang was obstinately choosing not to respond, though what she hoped to gain, I did not understand. I was preparing to expand the hairless patch, when at the base of her head, I noticed a mark. A tattoo. I ran my fingers through her hair, down her skull, until my pointer finger rested on the mark.

“Ms. Tang! How very…rebellious, of you.”

She said nothing, but under my hand, I felt her stiffen. I traced the mark, idly. Eight small dots, clustered in twos and threes, lined up to form a triangle. It seemed familiar. Oddly familiar. Something I had read about, or researched, or…

It was my turn to stiffen. I _did_ recognize that mark, or something very like it. I was connected; I’d found out about Alpha Protocol, and Deus Vult, and I maintain I know more about G22 than even Alan Parker, but I’d only heard the vaguest rumors about the agency this symbol was, reportedly, supposed to represent. Rumors so vague, they could not possibly be true. Stories about an agency that existed solely for the purpose of policing other agencies. It was only conspiratorial ramblings. And yet, here Ms. Tang sat, with their mark on her back. I traced it again.

Hm.

In my pants pocket, the alarm on my phone buzzed quietly. Thorton would be arriving soon. I’d planned on using Ms. Tang for an incentive, in the event that Thorton could not be convinced to see the error of his ways. Not as a threat, of course, but as a peace offering, of sorts. The plan would have to be changed.

“We’ll have to resume this later,” I said. She didn’t move. “I have an interview to conduct, I’m afraid.”

An important one. If she was who I did not want to suspect she was, if her people were targeting me, then having Michael Thorton by my side was no longer a pleasant benefit, but a necessity. If her people were real, Halbech needed to be strong.

And perhaps, one day, Thorton and I could actually turn Ms. Tang to our own purposes. Perhaps. It never pays to think small.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The game implies she works for the NSA, but there is also a lot of in-game evidence for why that, to me, seems like it isn't so. I haven't played through every possible combo in this game, so IDK. But. I have such a nice little headcannon on the evolution of Alp. Pro, G22, and where Mina fits into all of that. It doesn't belong here in the notes though.


	5. Leland is obnoxious, and Westridge knows it

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Westridge puts up with Leland's demands, even though Leland is a little punk

“I want her unharmed, Westridge” Leland instructed.

He didn’t know his place. It was the same thought I always had when dealing with Henry Leland. People like him didn’t get to command people like me. They didn’t even get to request things from people like me. They got to sit at home, on overplush couches, sniffing overpriced wines, ignoring their trophy partners until they lost their minds around age forty. And yet, they never were content with that.

He stared at me. He stared _down_ at me, that was the problem. Frigid, precise tone conveying the level of offense he felt at even having to specify it. Like he was the one who should be offended. Traitor or not, Agent Tang was still one of my own. I wasn’t gonna hurt her - yet. Not until I knew she deserved it.

“My team,” I told him, emphasizing the ‘my,’ “is gonna do what they feel they _have_ to.”

He sighed dramatically. “They are your people,” he conceded. “But I want her unharmed.” 

As if I hadn’t heard him the first time. The second problem with people like him, was they always had friends. You piss one off, you had to deal with the whole bunch. And since Leland knew the guys who signed our checks, I got the lovely responsibility of makin’ him believe I gave a damn what he wanted. The final problem with people like him, though, was that they wanted _everything_. And sometimes I just couldn’t stand to give it to them.

“When my people find her, if I feel it is appropriate to do so, we’ll letcha know,” I said coolly, and watched the slight widening of his eyes, the indignant frown creasing his forehead, the start of a retort forming on his lips. He pushed through it, turned it into a wide smile.

“Of course, your people,” he acknowledged, the smallest trace of annoyance twisting the sentiment, making it sound like the insult he doubtlessly wanted it to be. “They’ll let me know, when it is appropriate to do so.”

I almost put him back in his place, not for the first time today. _I_ , not my team, not his team, just me, would let him know. And that’d be an if, not a when.

The thing about people like that, though, was it was hardly ever worth it. They didn’t listen. So I nodded instead, and made a mental note to increase the size of our operational budget next month. Hit ‘em where it hurts.

“Good,” his smile softened, “I will be waiting to hear from you.”

He would be waiting a long damn time if I had any say in the matter - which, wait just a minute, I did. Well who da thunk it. I couldn’t cut him out of the loop completely, but I could kick him out of the command center. It felt good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I felt bad that I kept writing all this stuff about Leland parading around AP, and nothing about AP’s true commander, one Yancy Westdirigible. He is not too fond of Leland. Is anyone? (I say as I add a fic that revolved entirely around Leland)
> 
> It's gonna be real hard convincing people how much I hate this guy, isn't it? He's near the top of my top ten video game characters I hate and want to punch and wish much misery upon.


End file.
